[Wittrs] Re: Die Welt is alles, was der Fall ist
- From: Peter Caws <pcaws@xxxxxxx>
- To: CHORA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 11 Apr 2011 11:25:17 -0400
"Case" in English lacks the obvious reference to contingency of German "Fall,"
which is why I've suggested (see my short piece "Tractatus 7.1" in Philosophy
Now a few years ago - the Wittgenstein issue) that a better translation would
be "The world is everything that happens to be the case."
Peter Caws
University Professor of Philosophy
The George Washington University
(202) 994-8685
www.petercaws.com
----- Original Message -----
From: JL Speranza <Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx>
Date: Monday, April 11, 2011 10:50 am
Subject: Die Welt is alles, was der Fall ist
To: CHORA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> In a message dated 4/11/2011 1:48:46 A.M. ,
> bobdoyle@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
> Die Welt is alles, was der Fall ist.
> The world is everything that is the case.
> In German, chance is Zufall. Can we see Wittgenstein pointing to the
> utter
> contingency of the physical (and even the verbal) world?
>
> ---
>
> Yes, since Sean is joining the discussion and he leads a
> Wittgensteinian (I
> won't use "Witters") that should help. I think perhaps Wittgenstein
> (I
> won't say "Witters") meant to say,
>
> "Die Welst is alles, was der Zufall ist" but changed his mind?
>
> One should check with Grice's colleague, D. F. Pears, who perhaps did
> the
> wrong thing (but then Moore was already writing in English) when he
> decided
> that Ogden's translation of Wittgenstein (I won't say "Witters") was
> dated.
> He provided a new one with McDowell. I haven't checked it, to see if
> it
> reads, 'the case', too.
>
> But I wouldn't think since 'case' is such a glorious word:
>
> --- from Etymology online:
>
> "case (1)
> "state of affairs," early 13c., from O.Fr. cas "an event, happening,
>
> situation, quarrel, trial," from L. casus "a chance, occasion,
> opportunity;
> accident, mishap," lit. "a falling," from cas-, pp. stem of cadere
> "to fall,
> sink, settle down, decline, perish" (used widely: of the setting of
> heavenly
> bodies, the fall of Troy, suicides), from PIE base *kad- "to lay out,
> fall
> or make fall, yield, break up" (cf. Skt. sad- "to fall down," Armenian
>
> chacnum "to fall, become low," perhaps also M.Ir. casar "hail,
> lightning"). The
> notion being "that which falls" as "that which happens" (cf. befall).
> Given
> widespread extended and transferred senses in English in law,
> medicine,
> etc.; the grammatical sense was in Latin. In case "in the event" is
> recorded
> from mid-14c. Case history is from 1912, originally medical; case
> study is
> from 1933, originally legal."
>
> ----
>
> This should combine, in a pro-exegetical manner, with Grice, when he
>
> irritatingly writes,
>
> "Any attempt to remedy this situation" -- whatever -- "by resorting to
> the
> introduction of chance or causal indetermination [is that pleonastic?
> what
> sort of indetermination could there be which is not causal?] will
> only
> infuriate the scientist [some of them--not Doyle and the majority
> nowadays]
> without aiding the moral philosopher [if you find one!]."
>
> ----
>
> but 'chance' is already sort of introduced because 'case' is 'chance'
> and
> we do say things like "is it the case that Mary did it?"
>
> -----
>
> Perhaps we can elaborate on:
>
> --- stem distinctions:
> 'casus' "from L. casus "a chance, occasion, opportunity; accident",
> but it
> seems 'casus' and 'chance' have slightly different implications.
> Perhaps
> due to the fact that 'casus' derives from the stem of "what has
> fallen" while
> 'chance' may derive from the stem (same root, though) of something
> that
> "_is_ falling" (the '-nt-') root. And there may be a distinction
> there. If
> something HAS fallen or did fall, there's nothing much we can do
> about it, as
> opposed to something yet falling -- we can move away from any
> forthcoming
> 'accident' as it were.
>
> ---- the redundancy of 'casus' constructions.
>
> "it is the case"
> The world is everthing that is the case.
>
> ---- That is some GRAND statement, and if I were a cosmologist I would
> have
> it, inscribed in Greek, as my all-time motto.
>
> But in small-letter uses of 'case', as in:
>
> "It is the case that p"
>
> the implications may be different. When would we use, "it is the case
>
> that".
>
> It seems the usages correspond to what Grice called Strawson's "ditto"
>
> theory of truth (WoW:III)
>
> A: It is raining.
> B: That's true!
>
> --
>
> Or more interestingly:
>
> A: It is raining.
> B: That is _not_ the case.
>
> "It is not the case that it is raining".
> "Oh yes. It is the case that it is raining".
>
> This may connect with what Grice discusses in "Actions and Events" re
> this
> Reichenbach operator:
>
> Reichenbach coined an operator -- sigma operator -- to be read:
>
> "it is the case that..." -- discussed by Grice, op. cit., p. 5ff --.
>
> Thus
>
> Caesar was murdered.
>
> becomes
>
> "It is the case that Caesar was murdered."
>
> ----
>
> Grice (and indeed Davidson) found Reichenbach to be slightly otiose
> (if not
> contradictory), for one can prove with it that:
>
> "any event which consists of [some case] also consists of [some other
> case]
> and vice versa; that is to say, any pair of randomly chosen events
> are
> identical." (Grice, p. 6).
>
> -----
>
> (Grice manages to retain the redundant operator, though, with a
> license, or
> rather a prohibition to use "the 'co-referentiality principle' after
> the
> 'logical equivalence principle' has been used". But other issues may
> remain.
> Or not.
>
> Cheers,
>
> J. L. Speranza
>
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